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Tanequil (High Druid Of Shannara book 2) by Terry Brooks
01/03/2005 . Source: Martin Jenner 
pub: Simon and Schuster. 357 page hardback. Price: £17.99 (UK). ISBN: 0-7432-5674-3. Buy from Amazon US - Buy from Amazon UK
nb: US titles may only be available from Amazon US, and UK titles from Amazon UK. nds, Grianne's nephew Pen
has been charged by the ethereal King of the Silver River with retrieving the
talisman that will let him enter the Forbidding and rescue his aunt. The new
High Druid, Shadea a'Ru, is understandably less than thrilled with the nature
of Pen's quest and has set both the Druids themselves and her shadowy assassin
Aphasia Wye on his trail. Together with a handful of allies, Pen tries desperately
to find the Tanequil before it's too late, while in the war-torn borderland
of the Prekkendorran the totalitarian Federation unveils a terrible new weapon.
Things are looking fairly bleak for the freedom-loving citizens of the Four
Lands, but one has to keep these heroic types busy somehow. Heaven only knows
what they'd get up to otherwise.
As the middle book of an 'epic' trilogy, 'Tanequil' was always going to have
a few pacing problems. Following conventional dramatic form, the middle act
is the part where the heroes suffer the unrelenting hammer blows of defeat before
rising up for a stirring and climatic finale and this book is nothing but conventional.
Unfortunately, it's also as bland as unflavoured porridge, our protagonists'
misfortunes raising not a squeak of interest in the reader. Perhaps it is that
we've been through this before, in a stream of fantasy quest adventures reaching
back through Eddings and dozens of others to ol' master Tolkien. Everything
here has been done already, not least of all by Brooks himself who has made
a very successful career out of Tolkien style writing. This is by-the-numbers
fantasy and it's all so very dull.
When Terry Brooks began the 'Shannara' series, it was just what the genre needed.
Exciting, well-written and epic in scope, it was a joy to read. But like a faded
champion in search of past glories, it has lingered and what made it special
has long since departed. Instead of something new, we get a re-hash of old plots
and characters where only the names have changed. There's nothing here we haven't
seen before.
To give the author credit, his writing style is as good as it's ever been. To
a fantasy virgin or someone who is unfamiliar with Brooks' work 'Tanequil' could
be entertaining enough, possessing as it does a certain effortless beauty. The
descriptions are powerful and the world of the Four Lands is, as ever, an impressive
creation. Even the recent addition of high technology such as sunlight-powered
airships - something that doesn't mesh terribly well with the grit and magic
of the rest of the setting - can't spoil that depth. The characters, too, are
convincing, coming with flaws and neuroses built in. The dialogue occasionally
stalls and it's difficult to distinguish between speaking characters by speech
patterns alone, but that's neither here nor there. On the one hand, you have
the rich Shannara setting, built up over many years and a dozen or so novels,
and on the other hand you have...a great vacant hole where the plot should be.
That is 'Tanequil's biggest flaw. The entire novel reads like an extended chase
scene, with the Druids running along behind Pen Ohmsford like something from
a Benny Hill sketch. The interludes with Grianne's experiences in the Forbidding
are something else, showing a spark of originality that the series is otherwise
sorely lacking, but they are too few and far between. Only in those scenes does
something resembling a plot arise and it is there that the emphasis should have
been placed, not - as it sadly is - on the awkward and contrived love story
that is Pen's escape from the Druids.
Hopefully, the third book in the trilogy will remedy the many faults of this
one, but it certainly has a struggle ahead of it. Considering how slow things
have been moving so far, the pace is also going to have to drastically pick
up otherwise I can see 'High Druid Of Shannara' becoming a trilogy of four,
'Hitchhiker's Guide' style. This series has nothing to recommend it over Shannara's
past and it's those previous series' that a newcomer to Brooks' work should
seek out. For the veteran, 'Tanequil' will be nothing but a disappointment.
Whether the third book 'Straken' can throw a log on the fuel-starved fire of
originality remains to be seen, but Brooks certainly has the ability - all he
needs now are a few fresh ideas. Until they arrive, 'Tanequil' will find a place
on my 'shadow of former glory' shelf.
Martin Jenner 
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